Summer is Over

Andy, me, Ned and Ethan hanging out at the pool above Krichim. Andy titled this pic, "The Toughest Job You'll Ever Love," from an old PC slogan.

So this picture, this is an example of my summer. Beautiful mountains, having fun, relaxing, learning, great friends, swimming, tanning, eating, chilling. It couldn't be any better. Then we moved from Trainees to Volunteers. Then we moved away from our families. Then we lived and worked and communicated on our own. Alright, so I live in Razlog now and I'm not complaining. I have a great school with all new windows! I had colleagues and a director who genuinely care. I have a flat with cable internet and TV. I have a GSM and can (and do) send lots of text messages. I don't have it so bad!

The summer, the part of the summer I spent in Razlog, went very slowly. I really did not find much to do. I went to school. Of course, this is summer so teachers are on vacation. The teachers on duty would sit around and drink coffee with me. They'd talk in their typical Razlogshki dialect and my head would spin. On bad days I'd only spend a couple hours with them. On good days when I was all over this crazy language and the teachers seemed patient with me, we'd chill way past lunch. The rest of the day I would cook, go to the internet club, go to the gym, or sit and watch Bulgarian TV.

After such an exciting summer, I'm sure the rhythm of school will bring things back down to a more mellow pace... HAAAA. There is nothing rhythmic OR mellow about school here. But I love it. There was so much chaos in the 15 days leading up to the start of school. I'm sure there still is. We still don't have text books. I still don't have class rosters. I only learn my schedule one day at a time. Once I'm in the classroom with those kids and I am doing what I know I am capable of, teaching English and hanging out with (less teachery for "managing") these young people. I have had 6 classes in three days (not much, I know) and I've not yet left a class with out a smile. Oh, I know I could be teaching better. I know I could be making better lesson plans, executing them better, communicating better. I know. But I'm doing alright. I can tell my students are having fun. I am having fun. And I'm pretty sure we are all learning. That's what the Peace Corps is all about, right?